Thursday, December 6, 2012

As we have now passed Thanksgiving and are heading straight
towards the dreaded “shopping season” anyone who loves, lives with or has a
crush on a gardener is facing the age old problem — what do you buy for someone
who would spend their last nickel on an unusual bulb or package of seeds when
the ground is frozen solid and they can’t get a shovel in the ground. Trust me,
it’s almost as hard for us gardeners as it is for those trying to shop for us.

Last year was a
crazy anomaly, my ground never froze so I was digging and transplanting and
weeding and playing and making new beds all winter long, however if the
squirrels are to be trusted, this winter might be a wee bit colder and the
ground a lot harder to pry open. So here’s the short and sweet answer to all
your problems and issues.

GIVE GARDENERS GIFT CERTIFICATES.

I know, I know, no one thinks its as much fun to open a gift
certificate as it is to get an actual present, but you are wrong. Gardeners are a different breed. With a
gift certificate to our favorite nursery we can spend the next months imagining
which specific plant we’ve been lusting after will now come home with us next
spring. Switching from getting an armful of double black hellebores to
envisioning an usual dwarf cryptomeria, to using that gift card to chip away at
the espaliered apple tree we’ve always longed for, will make the winter months
zoom by. In fact I have clients whose eyes glaze over with joy as they recount
for me the birthday, the anniversary, or the Christmas they got a whole slew of
gift cards – all of them recalling it as being their best gift receiving experience
of all time.

So please, gift certificate us. If you have a need for us to
unwrap something, there are of course, other gifts you can add in, but that
little envelope is the one thing that says, not only do you really love us, it
also says you get us. Okay, now that we have that settled, here are soon of
your excellent choices for back up gifts. Stick with the traditional. Even if
we already have it.

Clippers. A gardener can never have too many clippers. They
need a pair, the way my friend Lori Barnaby says she needs reading glasses,
scattered within easy reach everywhere. At the moment I have a pair in my car,
a pair in the glove compartment of my husband’s truck, a pair at work, two pairs
in a basket on the front porch and another in the garage. I also have three
different loppers, one of which sometimes lives in my car as well. I also have
a car trowel, but as I am particular about trowels, I need to give you some
guidance. A trowel needs to fit nicely in the palm of the hand and the butt of
it is going to push against the heel of our palms so please, don’t one with a
decorative stud there, or a wrist lasso, it’s just going to give me and your
loved one blisters.

Gardeners also need gloves, although many of us
forget/prefer not to use them because we like getting dirt under our nails.
Look I know we’re a little peculiar, but don’t judge us, love us and get us
gloves that fit snuggly. When we use gloves, they really get sopping wet and
filthy, the best ones are easily cleaned. They also don’t have to be a fortune,
as we’re going to lose them and rip them and destroy them in our endeavors. On
that same note, although earth tones are beauty for socks and sweaters, it
makes tools and gloves and clippers very difficult to find when you put them
down on the ground for a second to tie something up or push back your hair and
then notice out of the corner of your eye the rose bush that needs deadheading
only to be distracted by the baby Japanese eggplants crying out to be picked
which leads you towards the raspberry patch that needs weeding. Two hours
later, when you go to pick up your clippers, it can be significantly less
hideous then tracking back through your steps while you try and remember where
you put them down, if you can spot them a mile away because they’re colored
like a male cardinal instead of the female house wren.

And ask us. I know you want to surprise us, but we’re
probably obsessing about something anyway, and although we don’t expect you to
understand the subtle lure of Digitalis
Illumination Pink, there’s nothing more romantic then a card that says it’s an
IOU for three of them as soon as they are available on this continent.